In The Buff

Good observations! My ignorant impression is that he's more Fortnite than weight training but thats based on nothing & I hope I'm wrong. Casey HAS to see the writing on the wall & see that he's on the outside in when it comes to becoming an NHL starter. If I were GM i'd personally trade him if value could be found. Not to say I think he's a bust, but some players don't fully develop til their mid 20's & I just don't think we can wait that long with him. I wish Casey would put a video on his twitter of him doing 10 pullups... that would give me some hope that he's added some strength & that he's grown into a man & that he wants to silence all the naysayers & doubters out there, one pullup at a time. ?

yay, Ryan O'Reilly playing like the poster boy of playoff hockey again. I'm so happy for him & the Blues! Not bitter or jealous at all... not one bit sigh

As much as its hard to be optimistic when times are tough for as long as they've been, I'll always love this team & support them no matter what. I've never been a season ticket holder but i go to tons of games, but these past few years in the 2nd half of the season when I've thought about going to a game, I've chosen to stay home instead. With the financial cost of attending, coupled with the prospect of watching another losing effort where the arena also feels like I'm in a mausoleum, its hard to justify going. I've heard that bolded comment before many times, that people should speak with their dollars & stop attending games because then ownership will hear us & feel more pressure to right the ship. That we're mad as hell & not gonna take it anymore! And that makes sense to me for sure & who knows, maybe that'd make a difference. But given the covid situation this year where fans most likely won't even be allowed to go anyways or at the very least be limited in number, even if we wanted to do something like that this year to send a message we couldn't. And quite honestly i believe the owners already are 100% aware of how we feel & that they need to do something. They can't be happy or satisfied themselves. The question is how much responsibility do they place on themselves & do they have the ability to make the correct decisions to turn this thing around now? GI Joe taught me when I was a kid that: Knowing is half the battle. Well they know what they've done so far hasn't worked, so that's half the battle. Do they know enough now where they can right the ship? Been waiting on that other half for awhile!

I see your point & i even agree with part of it. And yes the thinking with adding the veterans was that it'd help in turning around the culture there & aid in developing our players & in large part I'd say it worked. But your listing of prospects also speaks positively on Taylor because a bunch of those players have developed nicely or appear to be on the right path. Of course some of the players that have made it have been dealt to other teams & continue to play there & not here. Those that haven't developed have been shown not to be anything special with our franchise or any other or the jury is still out. Maybe those players are just what they are? You know, the Faschings, Baptiste's, Baileys, etc. But there are plenty of players that have come thru Roch & developed into the NHL. Yanno, we talk here regularly about our lack of good NHL ready prospects in the pipeline. I really don't know what else we expect with what we've had to work with. Its not like Taylor is the one who does the drafting or crafts the roster. As for not winning in the playoffs, yeah thats disappointing for sure. Last year we ran into a Toronto team that not only shut us out in the series but they shut out Cleveland as well. But to use their lack of winning a playoff series as a reason for termination seems suspect to me. (Even though thats not quite what you're saying) The Bills have lost their 2 past playoff games, so is their coach on the hotseat too? I personally just don't think that was really a determining factor. I honestly just don't see his firing as performance based, given how everything unfolded. Even Jbotts firing doesnt appear to be 100% performance based given the timeline of events & what happened (even though it should've been & was a factor). So i'm guessing when The Pegs decided to fire everyone that meant Taylor too so they could have a clean slate. Maybe it was even a cost savings measure too. Any guesses though are just that, guesses. Btw i just saw this video clip of Appert having to be held back during a brawl when he was coaching at RPI. Looks like he has a bit of Lindy Ruff in him haha

I don't understand why Taylor was let go either. Besides from developing & working with a bunch of players that would come thru there, before he coached the Amerks, they had missed the playoffs 3 consecutive years. Botts hires Taylor & coincidentally they make the playoffs 2 years straight & were poised to go a 3rd time. His record was a combined 116-65-20-13 in 214 games. Hard to say he was fired for poor performance imo. What he was fired for, is anyone's guess.

I wouldn't be against Pietrangelo for the points already mentioned. He would be an added mentor to the group, sort of in the same way as Beane feels its important with the Bills position groups. And when you talk about changing the culture, he's one piece that can do that. But only way it really works is if its in tandem with other moves. We can't just pick up another RHD, otherwise its Botterillesque. Lots of rumors floating around, it'll be interesting to see what comes of them.

Yep. And as much as i would've loved having a chance to be in the playoffs & obviously I would've taken it, but in my heart of hearts there's no way i feel we deserved it.... stupid playoff format or not.

I understand why lots of fans are saying lets give these hires a chance, i mean really thats the only thing we can do.. we're powerless in this whole equation. I used to be optimistic about our player transactions & administrative or coaching changes... thinking this time it'll be different. But it seems we've missed a lot more often than hit on these things during this Dark Age of Sabres history. And as we approach the prospect of a decade missing the playoffs, until something changes or the results are improved, it'll be hard for me to be optimistic about any of these moves. I understand why we've hired people our owners are familiar with & i wish Matt & Seth & Kevyn all the luck in the world. History shows they'll need it, and maybe things will work out great. I mean I don't think we're even that far away from where we wanna be. But nothing about these guys inspires me or gives me any more hope other than a broken clock is right twice a day.... we gotta get it right one of these times.

I'd take that trade in a heartbeat, just don't know if Calgary would feel the same

Agree totally about our local sports media. Not that surprising either without naming names (you already took care of that for me) ? But I'm not saying i know a lot about the Penguins but from watching their series versus Montreal, I saw Sheary all over the place & involved in a lot of plays. Thats not a stats based analysis just what i saw on the screen. However Game 1 with Sheary on the penalty shot, he doesn't cash in & misses it wide. If he makes that shot, the Pens win game 1 most likely & if they still win the 2nd game, they go up 2-0 in the series. Rodriguez I don't think even saw the ice. But they sure played disjointed & not like a well oiled machine, whereas Montreal seemed to gain confidence every game. I can also see why they'd miss Kahun. It makes me all warm inside knowing that we actually made out on a trade for once & got the better player. I do know they had a ton of injuries this year & that after having 4 months off, its hard to draw on the season you had with a break like that, to then carry it over into the postseason. With that much of a layoff, when the qualifying round started, it was like day 1 all over again to some extent. Their powerplay was also a big reason for their loss. They went 3 for 17, pretty disappointing when you have a Crosby & Malkin... which also leads into Carey Price. He played a heck of a series & was awarded with a Top 3 stars in 3 out of the 4 games. No coincidence they lost the series 3-1 imo. Lots of good points in that article by "those who know" for sure. For our Sabres, i think its far easier to discern what went wrong or is wrong with us. Our GM didn't address our team needs & as a result we had a subpar roster of talent, coupled with shaky goaltending where we were playing a guy who literally couldn't see. TLDR, it doesn't really take an inside scoop to see why we sucked lol.

Just saw this piece on MSN Sports by Chad. Gives a little more info than just the tweet itself, thought i'd share it in case anyone wanted to read it https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/nhl/could-the-sabres-not-qualify-brandon-montour/ar-BB17VarI Just like all of you it doesn't make much sense to me that we'd fear arbitration with Montour or that we'd risk letting him walk for nothing. This whole thing could just be clickbait for all we know. I also don't understand why in the tweet he says he could be traded tomorrow. Since the new year date is on October 9th. With the draft on 10/6, I'd think we'd have until roughly then. But i'll admit, I'm not well versed on these things.

Currently the 4th longest atm. Before a couple minutes pass & i get corrected again lol

yeah i left the possibly out, edited it prior to your post... I wasnt quite fast enough!

Besides from this possibly being the longest playoff game in NHL history, Korpisalo just set the record for most saves in a playoff game. Breaking Kelly Hrudey's save mark of 73 saves, a record that stood for 33 years. Crazy

Playoff hockey is about the only time you'll hear a man hoping for more periods ?

Bogosian slipping & falling at the blue line, poised to give up the puck is just like old times. Korpisalo is playing lights out so far. Not like we need any lessons on how far stellar goaltending can take you. Hasek schooled everybody on that. This game could go on forever...

U guys who say the Jays game is on local tv. Who's ur provider, Spectrum? Verizon FIOS? Verizon guide has a totally different game scheduled, but if you disregard that & go to that channel anyways, the Jays game is on. My father wanted to watch the game & was arguing with me that the game wasn't on because he saw the guide. I told him to just humor me & check out the channel & he just called to apologize to me haha.

Yeah my 1st thought obviously was Crosby with Sheary. Sheary's probably the perfect example of that

As a Sabres fan I know the feeling. Not about us scoring in a playoff game (because its been so long since we've been in one) or about paying for talent (see half our roster), but i can still relate lol. I'm still optimistic we'll get this thing turned around though... one day. It's always darkest before the dawn & we haven't seen sunshine in a decade. But while i think its extremely unlikely they'll trade a Marner, after getting knocked out of the playoffs in the 1st round for what, the 3rd season in a row if im not mistaken? There very well could be some thoughts that what they have now isn't working & to take an area of strength to fill out a big area of weakness. Stranger things have happened

The link you provided has the word "edit" in it & brings up an error while viewing. I'm guessing because you didn't save it or publish it. Didn't even get out of the gate with this one, we've reached a new low haha

Yeah Nashville works for me too. Even though I'm still disgusted any of these teams at all have a shot at #1OA. At this point for me its about making the best out of a less than ideal situation. Whatever team gets 1OA, I don't want them to be from our Conference

Yeah i really like that shade of blue i think. Reminds me of the blue in the 2018 Winter Classic jersey (which was one of my favorites). And the striping tweaks the traditional for a bit of an edgier look. Some cool ideas for sure. I just hope the official jerseys are something we can all be proud of. I remember before the slug came out there were lots of interesting concepts like this floating around that got me excited about our new jersey. And then the slug came out haha. They absolutely nailed the 50th Anniversary jerseys, so i can't wait to see what they come up with now.

There are some pretty cool jersey ideas on the 1st page of this thread from years ago. I remember some other ones from back then that were pretty cool too, but i couldn't find them on the internet. In my search i did however come across this page full of some good looking concepts that I didn't see posted anywhere here. Here's the link of them if u'd like to check em out https://buffalohockeycentral.com/2020/06/26/sabres-jersey-concepts/

Thankfully i never bought anything with the slug on it. Thought so then, still think so now haha.

Appreciate your exercise with the trades... it'd be great to get Monahan but there's no way in hell they'd trade him for Casey & a 2nd & Montour. Maybe if Casey was further along in his development, but even with our 8OA idk if it gets it done (though it'd obviously would be more enticing for them where they'd have to think about it). But if Calgary had missed the playoffs this year, then I could see the Flames wanting to make a move like that. He's their 1C & PP1, signed to a decent contract for a couple more seasons. Getting rid of him creates a hole in their lineup where if they made that trade, now they would be looking for a 1C/2C to replace him. Casey obviously isn't that guy & Backlund & Bennett aren't 1C material. Backlund could fill that spot if needed, but their C spine would be neutered. I'm no expert however so who knows, i could be totally wrong (wouldn't be the 1st time haha). I just think you're undervaluing Monahan. I also think Montour's value has dropped a bit (even if its just slightly) since when we traded Guhle & a 1st for him. And Casey's value is well, in the eye of the beholder. And that 2nd rd pick has a 25% chance at making the NHL, years down the road. So really the trade is a 1C for Montour & a couple prospects. Would u make that trade if you had Monahan? Maybe if their GM was Jbotts they would do it. I also would hope we made some move at Goalie for next year as well, unless you're going with: Hutton can see clearly again & betting on him to turn things around.